With the rise of alternative media, we have finally been able to see stories about China that would have been spun to fit negative Western narratives or completely omitted from the mainstream. I am proud to help report these facts and figures that you previously would have never heard. However, while hard data and the exciting new stories about Chinese technological and economic developments are important, nothing compares to lived experience. We hear stories about 48,000 kilometers of railways or countrywide access to 5G. But what does that actually mean to the people? Figures can only take us so far in understanding their impact.
That’s why it’s so important to ground knowledge about China with conversations with the Chinese themselves, who have experienced these transformations firsthand. As I frequently say in my videos, one of my favorite things to do in China is speak to elderly people and ask them about their experiences. They have lived through arguably the biggest transformation in history, going from one of the top ten poorest countries on Earth in the 1970s to being the largest economy on Earth today when measured in purchasing power parity.
On my most recent trip to China this past summer, I wanted to hear about that transformation from a younger perspective. I couldn’t think of anyone better at sharing that experience than journalist and fellow YouTuber Li Jingjing. Even while just being in her 30s and seeing comparatively much less than the elderly in China, what she has seen in just her lifetime has still been incredible.
Through her experiences of growing up in China, studying overseas, and traveling the world, Jing has become one of the best cultural communicators and bridges between the East and West. She also is much more in touch with China’s younger generations and can speak to the changing perceptions of both China and the West among the youth, having experienced it herself.
We met at the beautiful Jingshan Park in Beijing, overlooking the famous Forbidden City, to talk about China’s transformation. Jing shared personal stories about having things like no flushing toilets, communal showers, and shabby housing, to now being able to live in tall modern buildings, fluently speak English, and travel all over China—let alone the world. These are unimaginable accomplishments for her parents’ generation. But this wasn’t reserved just for Jing and a small group of elites. China has the largest middle class in the world, with hundreds of millions of people who can share similar stories. Jing has been on the front lines of the last frontiers of China’s poverty alleviation, reporting on amazing stories from Xinjiang to Tibet and all over China.
If you want to get a personal view of China’s transformation, as well as hear the attitudes of a new Chinese youth who are proud and confident about their country rather than looking up to the West, this is a conversation you don’t want to miss. Click on the link below!
Just a visit to China of at least ten days reveals what a phenomenal country it is, and how you have been Bullshitted with anti-China Western Propaganda.
Thank you for making so clear the amazing (actually unbelievable) growth and development for ordinary Chinese people. In 2002 there were 2 subway lines including one (line #2) surrounding central Beijing, within which most public toilets stunk and were openly communal, 90% of people walked or biked and owning a car was unimaginable.
Last month, on my 50th (?) trip to Beijing, I found the 6-lane (?) 5th Ring road bumper to bumper with some of the 27 million cars produced each year